At this time of year the local meadows are positively bursting with colourful early summer flowers. Last Monday I collected bright, glossy salsify, goats beard, cow parsley and field buttercups for a vase, which didn’t quite make it to a post:
They looked great at first, but were ultimately frustrating, because Salsify closes itself up tightly by midday and cow parsley drops its tiny spent flowers in droves that made it look like I’d been throwing salt around the table every five minutes. Ah well, lesson learnt!
This week’s wild flowers are better behaved, thank goodness:
We have a Foxglove that I managed to accidentally snap off whilst weeding:
I do like the way that the colour and freckles change down the spike, as the flowers mature.
We’ve got oodles of Ox-eyed daisies growing in our own meadow patch. They are fresh-faced and so cheerful:
And finally there are beautiful blue Nigella flowers, which have their own fizz and energy.
OK, Nigella is not strictly ‘wild’, but it does seed itself around everywhere, especially in our gravel driveway … so is game for a little culling. The flowers have strangely complex parts, but somehow, overall, feel like stick drawings.
The problem with this bunch of flowers is that they are so attractive to insects. With the back door open all afternoon I’ve had to keep chasing out bumblebees!
I am joining Cathy at Rambling in the Garden for her popular In-a-Vase-on-Monday meme. I admit to feeling a bit cheapskate sharing bunches of wild flowers, but if you check out Cathy’s post you find the whole gamut of pretty and glamorous blooms and arrangements.
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It’s a lovely pastel mix. I’ve grown Nigella from seed for the first time this year – it’ll be interesting to see if it self-sows. Bees can be surprisingly tenacious, as I found out myself yesterday when trying to get one to move along before bringing poppies into the house.
Nice problem to have though! Good luck with generating seedlings … It is usually a pretty reliable process
Not a cheapskate at all, just making use of what is readily available, which is as it should be. Last week’s ‘nearly’ vase is so pretty despite the salt and uncooperative salsify – and what a gorgeous flower the latter is. Why does it want to go to bed so early, I wonder? Today’s longer-lived vase makes such a fresh and cheerful statement, perhaps ‘welcome to summer’? Lovely, so thank you for sharing
Thanks Cathy. Not sure of the advantage of the flowers closing so early, but I guess it saves energy in some way. It appears in Linnaeus’s flower clock though: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linnaeus%27s_flower_clock
That link is absolutely fascinating, Allison – thanks for that
🙂
I love wildflowers and use them a lot in arrangements. I think both of yours are superb, even if they shed a bit. 😉
Thanks Eliza. The shedding wouldn’t have been so frustrating, if I hadn’t stood the vase right next to the condiments!!
Ha! Definitely a problem!
I love your wild flowers and am envious of the foxglove. We occasionally see wild ones here, but they are a boring dirty white colour! Love the Nigella too. 🙂
Thank you Cathy. I adore foxgloves of just about any kind, but they grow best in our garden in the vegetable beds, which is such a torment!
I’d never known your pretty flower called Nigella until recently. Here, I learned to call it Love-in-a-Mist, and it’s one of my favorites — a friend grows it in her garden. This year, it got a little rambunctious and she ended up growing it in her driveway, and her lawn, and around her patio…
It does look lovely in a vase!
Yes, it looks so delicate and misty, but actually is a tough, determined plant. I love it!
And you really can’t beat these wild June flowers. I make sure that I have areas where wild flowers flourish.
That’s a great idea. Unfortunately, in our garden they all seem to do best in the driveway, but I do happily have a bit of meadow. I am growing yellow rattle again to try to weaken the grasses some more.
I love wild flowers in arrangements, my favourite stand in the marquee at Chelsea was the wild flowers in test tubes, simply stunning.
Thanks for the prompt. I hadn’t seen that Chelsea display. It is rather wonderful. Reminds me of the suspended dried flower installation at Kew the other year.
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